Digital pedagogy takes it for granted that we live in an era of knowledge abundance. Part of the revolutionary character of digital has been its making available an abundance of knowledge for those fortunate enough to be on the right …
We rebels, so keen to see the old world toppled and the first light of the New Age break over the dark horizon, have a weakness for seeing false dawns. And it is a weakness that makes it so much …
The reader who respects the right of the bomb victim not to have the graphic photo of his dismembered body displayed onscreen will forgive us for presenting a very selective account of our reasons for leaving the teaching profession. Confessions …
Tweetable abstract: In its current form, the promotion of freedom in education is, at the same time, the promotion of its opposite. Online pedagogic advice about promoting learner autonomy tends to be guided by a rather dubious contrast between a …
Back in the early nineteenth century Hegel said that reading the morning papers was the modern equivalent of praying. Times have changed. Now it is turning before breakfast (the prayers that most matter are always those said on an empty …
It is said that the social media – Twitter in particular – have disproved the thesis, hastily propounded in the days before digital, that history had come to an end. A new beginning is now under way. Marx (although his …
When #edtech sceptics and technophiles start discussing their digital bone of contention the sceptics know that sooner or later someone from the latter camp will come out with: “But tech is just tools – neither bad nor good; what matters …
The world of myth is one dominated by fate – a supra-human imperative keeping people in their place. In our high-tech world we would like to think that not a trace of that old fatalism remains. “By the sweat of …
We live in an age which, for some odd reason, needs desperately to believe that it is continually being born anew – that its essence is something utterly different from the past, and so the old idea of trying to …
At no time in history have people been so obsessed with their tools. The edtech discourse turns discussions of education into discussions about the new educational tools, and the discourse of the digital revolution assumes that the latest wave of …
We have been re-reading Darkness at Noon, by Arthur Koestler, and on page 136 the central character, Rubashov, makes some interesting remarks about the implications of technological development for education. A stark contrast immediately came to mind between this perception …
If Sugata Mitra thinks of himself as basically a humble scientist investigating the benefits of educational technology, he is deceiving himself. His appeal – the crucial factor explaining his rise to fame – lies not in the scientific rigor of …
What is “personalized education”? Some teachers hear in the term nothing more than a confirmation that they are right to pay so much attention to the needs, interests and motivation of the individual pupils in their classes. Other teachers join …
In his 2013 TED talk at Long Beach California, Sugata Mitra gave a bold political twist to his story of education by placing it in the context of a grander story about empire. The now familiar story of the hole …
A few people in Greece are beginning to call for the personalisation of education and, online at least, the talk is gaining some momentum. Now, the mere idea of personalising education has an obvious initial appeal in Greece, since what …
A disturbing number of people are still talking about personalising education – making it person-centred. Often, this talk about the student as person is little more than snappy advertising copy that is left deliberately vague so that it can mean …
In glowing reports of the new digital technology written by educationalists, one of the most prominent buzzwords is: autonomy. Digital technology is great for learner autonomy, we hear. But is it? Of course, there are a thousand and one new …
Anyone using Google on November the 2nd saw this: How many different ways can you read that? Surely it cannot simply be read as an honour paid by the largest internet corporation to a winner of a Nobel prize. Can …
This is our response to a question posed by the TESOL Greece blog: ”During an economic crisis, resources (books, budgets, infrastructure) are limited but high standards and qualifications are required so that learners can survive on the job market. Can …
Marc Prensky, who was responsible for the term “digital native”, hoped that his newer term “digital wisdom” would become an equally popular buzzword for the digital revolution. As things stand, it seems to have fallen flat on its face. Why? …
After reading Hannah Arendt’s essay “The Crisis of Education” some perverse masochistic urge impelled us to look again at that video of the boy with the menacing face wagging his finger at the camera, telling an imaginary low-tech university graduate …
We are grateful to Nik Peachey for sharing an interesting video providing a lucid description of what a personal learning network is. Even if you are not one of those who still suspect that the PLN might be some CIA-backed …
Where’s the revolution? We’re back in England and are looking for signs of the sea change that was heralded by Marc Prensky (and others) when they claimed (back in 2001) to see a new generation connected to all things digital …
There is no chance now to have some Pauline road-to-Damascus experience. Every road has been lined by unpleasant things that negate the possibility of anything resembling an epiphany. Instead, the key experiences in our lives are ones in which we …
Imagine for a moment that you have been called to the palace and have been offered a too-good-to-refuse stipend to educate the royal goldfish. What would you teach it? What is the most important thing it should understand? Let me …
According to Professor Sugata Mitra, outdoctrination is what should counteract the dreaded indoctrination. It involves what Sugata Mitra calls a “minimally invasive” form of education. A school (it could be an old-fashioned maximally invasive school) sets aside some space and …
We want to raise a warning to teachers – warning them that in their midst are some very dangerous figures. They are arguing that the practice of teaching should end – that teachers should be made redundant. This is the …
The problem with digital books is quite simple: They are not things. They are not ordinary physical things – in the way that good old-fashioned paper books are physical things. We overlook this simple fact at our peril. And the …